Don't they harden them things.. any?
pulled the blade nutz off a 13mo old mtd to change out the factory blades ( 12m warranty mind ya.. ). Whatever metric ultra
fine thread they used to be, came right off in the nut using a 3/8" butterfly ( palm ) impact gun set to low. My ARM makes
more torque than that little butterfly...
I put a file on the face of the spindle shank and it dug in like mild steel... in fact... WAY WAY softer than a gr2 bolt..
Soft like a bolt that's been in a fire multiple times.. like recycled crud alloyed steel.
WTF! mtd ?
Ps.. pulled the spindles off and took apart.. no seal, no bearing, just 2 bushings, no grease fitting, housing is some cast
aluminum, or possibly zamak alloy. The spindles were VERY VERY, to cut new threads into ( IMHO.. TOO easy.. ). Blade hub
has a star profile to prevent blades from spinning, nut just clamps blade to the hub.
My guess is some cruddy barely hardenable alloy was used,a nd it was perhaps induction hardened on the surface, and some
gorilla at the factory tightened the nuts on past yeild, and just the galled metal was holding them on.
Oh yeah.. I tested the nuts.. THEY were hard... file skated right off. go figure.. hard nuts.. soft shaft... WTF!?
new spindles are 45-65$ apiece depending on exact dupe or a generic will fit. The exact dupe is 65$, and just like the
others.. no grease fitting, etc. The generics have grease fittings, but the deck mounting holes in the castings are not
drilled, they are blanks. I don't like the mounting screws MTD used anyway.. they are a tapered sheet metal screw!!
If I use the generics I'll just drill thru and tap for a real bolt thread, or drill thru for a nut maybee.. dunno. I'll
figgure that out when these old ones fail. I just re-threaded them and put new blades on.
pulled the blade nutz off a 13mo old mtd to change out the factory blades ( 12m warranty mind ya.. ). Whatever metric ultra
fine thread they used to be, came right off in the nut using a 3/8" butterfly ( palm ) impact gun set to low. My ARM makes
more torque than that little butterfly...
I put a file on the face of the spindle shank and it dug in like mild steel... in fact... WAY WAY softer than a gr2 bolt..
Soft like a bolt that's been in a fire multiple times.. like recycled crud alloyed steel.
WTF! mtd ?
Ps.. pulled the spindles off and took apart.. no seal, no bearing, just 2 bushings, no grease fitting, housing is some cast
aluminum, or possibly zamak alloy. The spindles were VERY VERY, to cut new threads into ( IMHO.. TOO easy.. ). Blade hub
has a star profile to prevent blades from spinning, nut just clamps blade to the hub.
My guess is some cruddy barely hardenable alloy was used,a nd it was perhaps induction hardened on the surface, and some
gorilla at the factory tightened the nuts on past yeild, and just the galled metal was holding them on.
Oh yeah.. I tested the nuts.. THEY were hard... file skated right off. go figure.. hard nuts.. soft shaft... WTF!?
new spindles are 45-65$ apiece depending on exact dupe or a generic will fit. The exact dupe is 65$, and just like the
others.. no grease fitting, etc. The generics have grease fittings, but the deck mounting holes in the castings are not
drilled, they are blanks. I don't like the mounting screws MTD used anyway.. they are a tapered sheet metal screw!!
If I use the generics I'll just drill thru and tap for a real bolt thread, or drill thru for a nut maybee.. dunno. I'll
figgure that out when these old ones fail. I just re-threaded them and put new blades on.